In a recent Op-Ed piece in the New York Times, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, the director of the CBO from 2003 to 2005, now president of the American Action Forum and obviously someone in the know, doesn’t buy it either. I quote: …the budget office is required to take written legislation at face value and not second-guess the plausibility of what it is handed. So fantasy in, fantasy out.
In reality, if you strip out all the gimmicks and budgetary games and rework the calculus, a wholly different picture emerges: The health care reform legislation would raise, not lower, federal deficits, by $562 billion
